MA: Staying on the sideperson subject, you've said that you don't need to be a professional to make great music. And you do have some non-professionals, don't you, on RSB and Family Dance, who play and sing their asses off � I suppose it's the best of both worlds.
DZ: I think so. I don't think there's anything to be gained by always going out to find the biggest and the best. On the new record we have a teen-age presence. We have a string bass player, Jacob Eigen, who is going into tenth, or maybe eleventh grade. His friend Josh plays the saxophone. They go to my daughter's school. It's good � it feels more like a family. And there's a group called the Ruby Theater Company from the Lower East Side that's primarily Hispanic teenagers � they do an a capella tune. We're casting a wider net, I think. And of course there are the kids who come in and sing. And the Sandy Girls, who are not professional
MA: They're not? They sound fantastic! How did you meet them?
DZ: They're great, aren't they? I met them in the kids' park � they were just babysitting for local kids. We got to talking about music and they came over to my place and sang. I told them I had a string band and that we'd back them up if they wanted to be a group. And one of them, Rosita, or CeCe as she likes to be called, is our drummer. She's got a really unique groove. I couldn't ask another drummer to play that way. In fact, I'd rather not have a drummer at all unless he or she can do something different. I'm a big believer in that.
MA: How do you choose songs?
DZ: At the end of the day, they just have to be great songs. It's all gotta feel great. On Rocket Ship Beach I was just trying to hurry up and finish. My wife said, why not "Polly Wolly Doodle?" I said, God, I can't even remember that song. But it was a great idea.
I found an amazing two-CD set by Mike and Peggy Seeger doing all of the songs from Ruth Crawford Seeger's songbook called American Folk Songs for Children; that's where I learned "Goodbye Old Paint."
Others came about in different ways. "Over the Rainbow" and "Keep on the Sunny Side" my daughter wanted to hear. I just try and keep my antennae up � that's really what it is.
MA: Another crass question: is money ever a consideration in choosing covers? I mean, do some songs cost more than others?
DZ: No. It's called licensing a tune or what we call "mechanicals." There's a fixed rate. Now, a lot of the songs I cover are in the public domain, which means they're free for anyone to record or perform. For the others, there's one agency that most of the publishing companies will use to handle the paperwork for mechanicals: the Harry Fox Agency. So, I call them up and say I want to use "Bushel and a Peck." They send the paperwork and I give them 7.35 cents for every record I sell. Now, you can plead for a discount, but it's generally seven cents plus. It feels fair to me � it's a pleasure to be able to record those songs.
On the new CD we only had to do mechanicals for a few tunes. A lot are in the public domain, I wrote four, Barbara wrote one and Jose Garcia from the Ruby Theater Company wrote one. So, of course, I'm happy to be paying Barbara and Jose mechanicals.
MA: Tell me about "Bushel and a Peck." It's from Guys and Dolls, right? What made you want to cover it?
DZ: Oh that was easy. I would hear so many mothers sing that to their kids. I knew it was from Guys and Dolls. In fact, I'm not a big show tune guy, but almost every song in that show sounds like a folk song to me, like it could be played with a few chords on a guitar. So, I wanted to do that with "Bushel and a Peck," to break it down to its skeletal elements.
MA: Even so, it still sounds fairly sophisticated for a folk song. I mean, it changes key after every verse!
DZ: Yeah � that makes it really fun. But the actual chords are very simple, like a country and western tune. But it's a good example of what I'm after: there shouldn't be anything daunting about doing a show tune at home. Just pick up your guitar! I want my records to be a springboard for people. They should say, "Yeah, that sounds simple and easy and fun."
MA: When I discovered that you had words and chords on your website I suddenly became a hero in my house.
DZ: (laughs) It was big pain in the ass assembling all of that stuff, but I felt it was important to do it, to make it accessible.
MA: You describe festival five as "�the sound of a neighborhood band on the front stoop playing tunes after dinner for a family dance. festival five records is the sound of a group of 9 and 10 year olds singing a sixty-year-old broadway song in the basement of a 150 year old row house. it's the sound of a 40-year-old dad on a blue porch singing a 400 year old story song about a frog that marries a mouse." It seems like a long way from a sweaty bar in Ohio at 2AM. Is it?
DZ: Yes and no. It feels like it's a huge step up in terms of the hours (laughs). But it's really not if you look at what we originally set out to do with the Del Fuegos. Not long ago I found an old business card we had made when we were still up in New Hampshire trying to book shows; we called ourselves "a dance trio." That's really all we wanted out of the whole deal: for people to come out and dance. The attitude was really communal then, as it is now. We want people to participate, we don't want to be the big band on the stage. Of course, that's what the Del Fuegos became ultimately and that's when it started to become sort of a lifeless, uninteresting scenewe got onto the taller stages, the pants got tighter, scarves started to appear, more colored lights, all that junk. So I feel like it's come full circle back to the original idea, which is to play live. At the beginning of the Del Fuegos, that's all we cared about. We weren't interested in getting a record contract per se; we just wanted to make records so we could keep playing in front of people.
Dan Zanes...continued
M
Misha
(view)
MA: Staying on the sideperson subject, you've said that you don't need to be a professional to make great music. And you do have some non-professionals, don't you, on RSB and Family Dance, who play and sing their asses off � I suppose it's the best of both worlds.
DZ: I think so. I don't think there's anything to be gained by always going out to find the biggest and the best. On the new record we have a teen-age presence. We have a string bass player, Jacob Eigen, who is going into tenth, or maybe eleventh grade. His friend Josh plays the saxophone. They go to my daughter's school. It's good � it feels more like a family. And there's a group called the Ruby Theater Company from the Lower East Side that's primarily Hispanic teenagers � they do an a capella tune. We're casting a wider net, I think. And of course there are the kids who come in and sing. And the Sandy Girls, who are not professional
MA: They're not? They sound fantastic! How did you meet them?
DZ: They're great, aren't they? I met them in the kids' park � they were just babysitting for local kids. We got to talking about music and they came over to my place and sang. I told them I had a string band and that we'd back them up if they wanted to be a group. And one of them, Rosita, or CeCe as she likes to be called, is our drummer. She's got a really unique groove. I couldn't ask another drummer to play that way. In fact, I'd rather not have a drummer at all unless he or she can do something different. I'm a big believer in that.
MA: How do you choose songs?
DZ: At the end of the day, they just have to be great songs. It's all gotta feel great. On Rocket Ship Beach I was just trying to hurry up and finish. My wife said, why not "Polly Wolly Doodle?" I said, God, I can't even remember that song. But it was a great idea.
I found an amazing two-CD set by Mike and Peggy Seeger doing all of the songs from Ruth Crawford Seeger's songbook called American Folk Songs for Children; that's where I learned "Goodbye Old Paint."
Others came about in different ways. "Over the Rainbow" and "Keep on the Sunny Side" my daughter wanted to hear. I just try and keep my antennae up � that's really what it is.
MA: Another crass question: is money ever a consideration in choosing covers? I mean, do some songs cost more than others?
DZ: No. It's called licensing a tune or what we call "mechanicals." There's a fixed rate. Now, a lot of the songs I cover are in the public domain, which means they're free for anyone to record or perform. For the others, there's one agency that most of the publishing companies will use to handle the paperwork for mechanicals: the Harry Fox Agency. So, I call them up and say I want to use "Bushel and a Peck." They send the paperwork and I give them 7.35 cents for every record I sell. Now, you can plead for a discount, but it's generally seven cents plus. It feels fair to me � it's a pleasure to be able to record those songs.
On the new CD we only had to do mechanicals for a few tunes. A lot are in the public domain, I wrote four, Barbara wrote one and Jose Garcia from the Ruby Theater Company wrote one. So, of course, I'm happy to be paying Barbara and Jose mechanicals.
MA: Tell me about "Bushel and a Peck." It's from Guys and Dolls, right? What made you want to cover it?
DZ: Oh that was easy. I would hear so many mothers sing that to their kids. I knew it was from Guys and Dolls. In fact, I'm not a big show tune guy, but almost every song in that show sounds like a folk song to me, like it could be played with a few chords on a guitar. So, I wanted to do that with "Bushel and a Peck," to break it down to its skeletal elements.
MA: Even so, it still sounds fairly sophisticated for a folk song. I mean, it changes key after every verse!
DZ: Yeah � that makes it really fun. But the actual chords are very simple, like a country and western tune. But it's a good example of what I'm after: there shouldn't be anything daunting about doing a show tune at home. Just pick up your guitar! I want my records to be a springboard for people. They should say, "Yeah, that sounds simple and easy and fun."
MA: When I discovered that you had words and chords on your website I suddenly became a hero in my house.
DZ: (laughs) It was big pain in the ass assembling all of that stuff, but I felt it was important to do it, to make it accessible.
MA: You describe festival five as "�the sound of a neighborhood band on the front stoop playing tunes after dinner for a family dance. festival five records is the sound of a group of 9 and 10 year olds singing a sixty-year-old broadway song in the basement of a 150 year old row house. it's the sound of a 40-year-old dad on a blue porch singing a 400 year old story song about a frog that marries a mouse." It seems like a long way from a sweaty bar in Ohio at 2AM. Is it?
DZ: Yes and no. It feels like it's a huge step up in terms of the hours (laughs). But it's really not if you look at what we originally set out to do with the Del Fuegos. Not long ago I found an old business card we had made when we were still up in New Hampshire trying to book shows; we called ourselves "a dance trio." That's really all we wanted out of the whole deal: for people to come out and dance. The attitude was really communal then, as it is now. We want people to participate, we don't want to be the big band on the stage. Of course, that's what the Del Fuegos became ultimately and that's when it started to become sort of a lifeless, uninteresting scenewe got onto the taller stages, the pants got tighter, scarves started to appear, more colored lights, all that junk. So I feel like it's come full circle back to the original idea, which is to play live. At the beginning of the Del Fuegos, that's all we cared about. We weren't interested in getting a record contract per se; we just wanted to make records so we could keep playing in front of people.
DZ: I think so. I don't think there's anything to be gained by always going out to find the biggest and the best. On the new record we have a teen-age presence. We have a string bass player, Jacob Eigen, who is going into tenth, or maybe eleventh grade. His friend Josh plays the saxophone. They go to my daughter's school. It's good � it feels more like a family. And there's a group called the Ruby Theater Company from the Lower East Side that's primarily Hispanic teenagers � they do an a capella tune. We're casting a wider net, I think. And of course there are the kids who come in and sing. And the Sandy Girls, who are not professional
MA: They're not? They sound fantastic! How did you meet them?
DZ: They're great, aren't they? I met them in the kids' park � they were just babysitting for local kids. We got to talking about music and they came over to my place and sang. I told them I had a string band and that we'd back them up if they wanted to be a group. And one of them, Rosita, or CeCe as she likes to be called, is our drummer. She's got a really unique groove. I couldn't ask another drummer to play that way. In fact, I'd rather not have a drummer at all unless he or she can do something different. I'm a big believer in that.
MA: How do you choose songs?
DZ: At the end of the day, they just have to be great songs. It's all gotta feel great. On Rocket Ship Beach I was just trying to hurry up and finish. My wife said, why not "Polly Wolly Doodle?" I said, God, I can't even remember that song. But it was a great idea.
I found an amazing two-CD set by Mike and Peggy Seeger doing all of the songs from Ruth Crawford Seeger's songbook called American Folk Songs for Children; that's where I learned "Goodbye Old Paint."
Others came about in different ways. "Over the Rainbow" and "Keep on the Sunny Side" my daughter wanted to hear. I just try and keep my antennae up � that's really what it is.
MA: Another crass question: is money ever a consideration in choosing covers? I mean, do some songs cost more than others?
DZ: No. It's called licensing a tune or what we call "mechanicals." There's a fixed rate. Now, a lot of the songs I cover are in the public domain, which means they're free for anyone to record or perform. For the others, there's one agency that most of the publishing companies will use to handle the paperwork for mechanicals: the Harry Fox Agency. So, I call them up and say I want to use "Bushel and a Peck." They send the paperwork and I give them 7.35 cents for every record I sell. Now, you can plead for a discount, but it's generally seven cents plus. It feels fair to me � it's a pleasure to be able to record those songs.
On the new CD we only had to do mechanicals for a few tunes. A lot are in the public domain, I wrote four, Barbara wrote one and Jose Garcia from the Ruby Theater Company wrote one. So, of course, I'm happy to be paying Barbara and Jose mechanicals.
MA: Tell me about "Bushel and a Peck." It's from Guys and Dolls, right? What made you want to cover it?
DZ: Oh that was easy. I would hear so many mothers sing that to their kids. I knew it was from Guys and Dolls. In fact, I'm not a big show tune guy, but almost every song in that show sounds like a folk song to me, like it could be played with a few chords on a guitar. So, I wanted to do that with "Bushel and a Peck," to break it down to its skeletal elements.
MA: Even so, it still sounds fairly sophisticated for a folk song. I mean, it changes key after every verse!
DZ: Yeah � that makes it really fun. But the actual chords are very simple, like a country and western tune. But it's a good example of what I'm after: there shouldn't be anything daunting about doing a show tune at home. Just pick up your guitar! I want my records to be a springboard for people. They should say, "Yeah, that sounds simple and easy and fun."
MA: When I discovered that you had words and chords on your website I suddenly became a hero in my house.
DZ: (laughs) It was big pain in the ass assembling all of that stuff, but I felt it was important to do it, to make it accessible.
MA: You describe festival five as "�the sound of a neighborhood band on the front stoop playing tunes after dinner for a family dance. festival five records is the sound of a group of 9 and 10 year olds singing a sixty-year-old broadway song in the basement of a 150 year old row house. it's the sound of a 40-year-old dad on a blue porch singing a 400 year old story song about a frog that marries a mouse." It seems like a long way from a sweaty bar in Ohio at 2AM. Is it?
DZ: Yes and no. It feels like it's a huge step up in terms of the hours (laughs). But it's really not if you look at what we originally set out to do with the Del Fuegos. Not long ago I found an old business card we had made when we were still up in New Hampshire trying to book shows; we called ourselves "a dance trio." That's really all we wanted out of the whole deal: for people to come out and dance. The attitude was really communal then, as it is now. We want people to participate, we don't want to be the big band on the stage. Of course, that's what the Del Fuegos became ultimately and that's when it started to become sort of a lifeless, uninteresting scenewe got onto the taller stages, the pants got tighter, scarves started to appear, more colored lights, all that junk. So I feel like it's come full circle back to the original idea, which is to play live. At the beginning of the Del Fuegos, that's all we cared about. We weren't interested in getting a record contract per se; we just wanted to make records so we could keep playing in front of people.
